“Of course I’m going again,” she said with a laugh, as if it could be any other way. “My mom and I have gone every year since the first one, so it’s kind of a tradition. Besides, I love plants and flowers of all kinds. I was a florist in Cocoa Beach. Who’d have thought it, right?”

Anziano, a child when she first started making the annual trek to Epcot, will see a vastly different festival than the one she first visited – the first such event -- and one much longer in duration: having opened Feb. 28, it will continue through May 28.

“It was what, 38 days in 1994?” she asked. “How long will this year’s be, 90 days? Wow.”

It was and it is: 38 days; and then for seven years, 45 days; for one year, 60 days; for a few more years, 75 days. This year it expands to 90 days in a park to which insiders sometimes refer as “Festival Land.”

It fares well with the Epcot Festival of the Arts in January and February; the Epcot International Food and Wine Festival each fall; and the Epcot International Festival of the Holidays at year’s end.

Twenty-five years ago, this, Epcot's oldest such celebration, concentrated to a much larger degree on the way Disney properties look, flower-and-greenery-wise. It has evolved into general festivity for all that blooms.

Gardens

The current version, which also celebrates the 35th anniversary of the park, has, as always, millions of multicolored brilliant blooms; at least 70,000 bedding plants surround Future World lakes. There, 220 mini-gardens float, viewed near flame-colored “flower towers” on the bridge to the World Showcase.

A new topiary scene at Epcot’s entrance, featuring Mickey and Minnie Mouse and Goofy, celebrates the festival’s silver anniversary, greeting visitors with a blaze of color. Inside, naturally, more than 100 Disney character or representative topiaries are back, including the now-traditional pandas and bromeliad dragon at the China pavilion; The Three Caballeros at Mexico; Woody of “Toy Story” film and soon-to-be theme park fame at the American Adventure; and co-star Buzz Lightyear in Future World.

The new How-To Garden in Future World at the 25th Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival shows guests how to get creative in their own home gardens.(Photo: Matt Stroshane/Submitted photo)

The festival also continues its emphasis on being informative, with tips readily available from members of the Master Gardener program of the University of Florida's Center for Landscape Conservation and Ecology, as well as Disney horticulturalists, and displays show visitors how to terrace a garden, do pet-related scenes, grow herbs, attract honeybees and welcome butterflies.

Eric Darden, Epcot horticulture manager, has been there the whole time and is only too eager to discuss what the show has become, much of it driven by the interests of its modern visitors.

“For example, five or six years ago, we went from mainly ornamental gardens to an emphasis on edible plants (in some areas), and the result was four times the attendance," he said. "... This year, we’ve added an expanded play area. We said, ‘Let’s try to make it more family-friendly, and so we put in more (areas) for parents and children to explore together. In the maze, you sometimes see as many adults as kids.”

Food

The culinary aspects of the show also have grown.

Once, food at the flower show was limited to what was available from permanent restaurants and food stands. Now decorative, representative kiosks dot the way around World Showcase, attended by long lines of the hungry and curious.

Food made with fresh ingredients, many grown in the park, takes center stage at the Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival.(Photo: Matt Stroshane/Submitted photo)

On it goes.

At the Pineapple Promenade, Playalinda Brewing Company of Titusville’s violet lemonade ale is featured, and the Cider House has Florida Beer Company’s Caribé Pineapple Tropical Hard Cider.

“Five years ago, we ventured to expand our food (offerings),” said Gregg Hannon, Epcot’s culinary director, who oversees all the park’s restaurants, as well as the flower and garden festival’s its 15 outdoor kitchens, each of which has its own garden of herbs and produce.

The interest, and therefore emphasis, on growing plants for the table is there.

“The culture of growing your own food continues to trend, and our guests each year have quite a few questions related to edible gardens,” Darden said. “They get a big kick out of comparing items in our gardens with the herbs and produce our chefs incorporate into the festival’s outdoor kitchen recipes.”

Music

Concerts take place daily too, also having evolved from the days when so many of Epcot’s visitors were of an age to be thrilled by the music of the 1960s and amused by the “flower power” connection.

“Over the years we’ve progressed,” said David Baldree, a producer for Disney Parks Live Entertainment. “We started with the music of the ‘60s and ‘70s and then moved forward to the ‘70s and ‘80s in accordance with the musical interests of our guests. Now it is more inclusive, and we call it the Garden Rocks Concert Series. We’re always trying to keep up, and now we have a little of everything, including some acts that have played at Eat to the Beat (the Epcot Food & Wine Festival series).”

So Garden Rocks, featuring the likes of the Little River Band, the Orchestra (which includes former members of ELO), Foghat, Survivor, Smash Mouth, Rick Springfield, Jo Dee Messina, Don Felder of the Eagles, Lonestar and longtime favorites Peter Noone (of Herman’s Hermits), and the latter-day Village People, Guess Who and Spinners, will have three concerts daily, with dining packages available at Epcot restaurants.

That’s dandy with Anziano, who still misses certain aspects of the simpler, smaller festivals of years past, including Barbie shows that allowed small children to go onstage at American Adventure and dress fancily, in the style of the Mattel doll (“We always wanted to be Barbie but never were picked.”

She also hopes the scavenger hunts of the past will have improved to where winning children receive something more than empty plastic eggs.

But she will go, because that is what she does, hoping for a wider variety of flowers (“Not too many azaleas. Who wants to see a lot of azaleas?”) and looking forward to those topiaries and gardens.

“I’m probably most looking forward to the arrangements of flowers at the countries,” Anziano said. “You always get to see the flowers that are native to Florida, to this country, but I find it so interesting when they bring in some of the flowers and plants from other countries, the things you don’t ordinarily see, and I wish they’d do more of that.”

As the streets filled the walkways outside the pavilion at which he spoke, Darden smiled.

“I think people will like we’ve done this year,” he said. “I think it will be a big hit.”

Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival

When: Through May 28

Where: Epcot, Walt Disney World

How much: Included in Epcot admission, which starts at $102 for one day